Containers, and here particularly bottles, are routinely cleaned either for refilling or before first filling. The same applies to cans or similar containers. So-called rinsers are known in which new bottles are blown out before being filled or sterile air being applied, in order to remove any possible dust or dirt particles, resulting from the manufacturing process, from the containers. When pure plastic bottles are used, this procedure sometimes poses problems due to the electrostatic charging of these bottles. Dirt particles in the ambient air are additionally attracted or existing particles show a strong adhesion.
For this reason it has already been proposed in EP 1 048 365 B1 to ionise the treatment medium, in order to totally or completely remove the inherent or adherent electrostatic charge of the container or to neutralise it. The adhesion of dirt particles is reduced through this charge equalisation and therefore the cleaning effect is improved significantly. This has proven to be successful.